Eva von Dassow Speaks at University of Minnesota Regents Open Forum, June 2010

[nuckolsstangl]

OMG checkout this video RIGHT NOW got me 500 views in one evening without youtube freezing it! Y2BVIEWS COM

[jette777]

good going eva

[TSIMedia1]

Prof. Dassow presented eloquently the truth behind higher education’s gutting by the corporate university. That commentators cared about her body movements or characterized her as detached from reality is an indication of America’s brainwashing by capital or possibly deliberate propaganda. Prof. Dassow we would like to invite you to write for our journal or collaborate with us at the Transformative Studies Institute, Regards, John Asimakopoulos, Executive Director (follow links or Google us)

[ShortyLongstrokin]

Her body moves weirdly when she speaks, and she looks like she's wearing a cape. That and the rapid speaking distracts from what she's saying.

[zz44aa]

She's right.

Universities are run by no nothing educrats who are grossly incompetent as well as avaricious.

[macmilla11]

On what planet does this woman spend most of her time? As a member of the same college at the same university, I've seen every cost and revenue projection, as well as the relevant data from the State Economist and the State Demographer. In short, this woman is talking out of her ***. She's a typically example of a know-it-all academic who thinks because she knows about some small subset of "classical and near eastern studies" she can speak authoritatively about economics and management. BS!

[stancatherine1]

She could be talking about Rutgers University in New Jersey! It's a pattern in the higher education "industry" that does not bode well for students or our future as a country that needs a well-educated population and research for today and into the future. Public education is fundamental for a democratic country, but the presidents, other university officers, and the board members treat the universities they are supposed to serve as their own private corporations. This must change!

[vulcan2541]

i don't understand the complaint about paying coaches. almost all D-1 football programs pay for themselves and send money to other sports if not the university general fund, and all the big ten athletic departments ought to be well in the black thanks to big ten network revenue. this is significant because regents are going to hear it as whining if you include irrelevant/confused stuff in your list of complaints.

aside from that, powerful stuff.

[MrThing]

She speaks the truth. All university faculty really need to realize the the demonstration is the enemy (bunch of visionless block-heads with no understanding of the words "university education."

[redetrigan]

I found this via links at LeiterReports and InsideHigherEd. Hopefully the proliferation of this video will give Prof. Dassow's speech more force (especially if, as wbg31245 says, the regents seemed not to care while she was speaking).

[ddsoco]

She talked too fast. Could have been a lot more powerful with a more polished delivery.

[wbg31245]

@ddsoco

There was a three minute time limit, at the end she is gaveled down. The regents were paying NO attention. The speech is important for its content, not the delivery.

[bakedbeansface]

1. She should have but the speech in half, and then spoken at human speed.

2. Too many abstractions and too many recondite words. I wonder who she thought her audience was here? The Regents? Or a room full of comparative literature majors?

The sad thing is she's probably right; but I can't be sure until I translate her speech into English.

[jsconce]

Every year in my humanities class I get a couple of kids sent to school by their parents (or the State) to study the sciences who end up in my office telling me how miserable they are. They can do the work, but hate it. This makes no rational sense to me. A career in the sciences is much more lucrative and useful--how could they not like it? If we are going to shed ourselves of the humanities, perhaps we need science to create a pill that will help produce more artless and docile subjects.

[geodesicks]

@jsconce : They shouldn't be doing science then. They should do what they want, take up the arts, practice a vocation, start a company. All I am suggesting is to keep a tight check on funding in the arts and humanities. Otherwise we do end up with facetious publications like Social Text, where obscurity gets passed around for profundity and sloppy thinking based on the most tenuous of evidence reigns free. And the arts become a scam for an academic career.

[romeandavilla]

arts funding is an absolute drop in the ocean of the money spent on funding in other areas. Liberal democracy can only be sustained through liberal education, and the later is perhaps the only place where critical thinking will be preserved in the dark ages we seem to be so intent on sliding into.

[geodesicks]

@romeandavilla : Obviously you have no idea of modern post-modernism and the complete scam it is becoming, trying to lend credibility to Islamist movements, coddling vacuous cultures as morally equivalent to the post-Enlightenment culture, which is where the real threat of a slide into the Dark Ages is coming from. Reason, science, and an absolute regard for hard evidence is what is required going forward. Not wishy-washy feel-good thinking.

[rhorto01]

Ah I see the fascists are out. "For the good of the volk the recalcitrant should be forced into 'productive areas of knowledge' like physics."

Funny thing is a liberal society which allows the individual to decide for themselves how best to constitute the intellectual, moral, and ethical core of their being was once thought to be the only way to ensure science could thrive. Instead, today liberal education is sacrificed in the name of a techocratic bureaucracy. Barbarism by another name.

[geodesicks]

@rhorto01 : There is a lot more to physics or the sciences than production, you know. The sciences do not concern themselves with production at all, that would be the technological departments. The sciences concern themselves with finding out about the world, and a good scientific education inculcates a discipline of thinking, an absolute dependence on evidence for all claims, and a thorough examination of one's uncertainties in making those claims about the world.

[rhorto01]

@geodesicks

I'm sorry but I don't see how science is furthered by creating practioners who couldn't understand Karl Popper, Carl Hempel, Thomas Kuhn, Charles Sanders Peirce, Francis Bacon, Roger Bacon, AJ Ayer, Henri Bergson or Aristotle if their lives depended upon it. After all science cannot simply posit the grounds for its own legitimacy. (If you don't understand why, please go take a philosophy class.)

[geodesicks]

@rhorto01 : Most senior scientists understand the epistemological basis of the scientific method quite well, better than most philosophers I have encountered in my life. These are things people of sufficient curiosity can work out for themselves or read up on. One doesn't need to fund academic departments too much to keep such knowledge alive. They generate fools that can taken in by papers like "Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity" written specifically to expose them.

[rhorto01]

@geodesicks: You've just proved my point. You seem to be unable to make the proper distinction between the practioners of formal logic and post-modern mumbo jumbo.  Of course there are lousy philosophers, but there are also lousy scientists (how is "cold fusion" going?) All of your prejudices against anything that isn't "science" seems to be more an excercise of the ecological fallacy than anything else. I'm sorry if that bother you. Any complaints can be directed towards rationality.

[geodesicks]

@rhorto01 : That is why I advocate a tight monetary bottleneck for the arts and humanities. It cuts down on the mumbo jumbo. Science, on the other hand, should have a much wider bottleneck because very often, as has been borne out by history, deviations from the beaten track that is possible with generous spending sometimes bear out returns that are paradigm-shifting breakthroughs. So such thing can be said about the arts and humanities, more funds means more sloppy thinkers in the system.

[rhorto01]

@geodesicks Actually it is exactly the opposite dynamic. It is harder to attract and keep the best people to a profession that is continually being squeezed and killed by a death of a thousand cuts. You get all the mumbo jumbo because only the cranks WANT to stay at a job that actually has people losing ground year by year in take home pay But also, mumbo jumbo is the price we pay for living in a free society, the same way we put up with eugenicists or socio-biologists (ie scientific cranks.)

[geodesicks]

Three words should sum up why funding in the humanities should be tightly regulated, as compared to, say, the sciences: "The Sokal Hoax".

[TheLadyprofessor]

I hope the good professor is able to keep her job now. I'm sure she'll be watched and the administration will find a way to silence her.

[jeffwithtwoels]

I've rarely heard academic reality so clearly articulated.

[MaCs1313]

@jeffwithtwoels It is an exceptional speech, with accurate and speedy delivery, with a good and firm message. I am in awe.

[astroturfwar]

It's bewildering to hear an administration express concern at a decline in new enrollment and in the very next breath reduce entire programs to a bare-bones curriculum. Theology [since it has been mentioned below] may not be the central force of the university, but for much of the US students flock to religious studies courses. At my university--I've heard--Religious Studies has one of the highest enrollment rates, yet still faces debilitating budget cuts.

[geodesicks]

@astroturfwar : Because not all knowledge is equally worthy. Knowledge about Marvel comic book characters, interesting and intricate as they may be, are not worth a university department and equal funding to, say, physics. Hordes could flock to take courses on comic book characters, but with no returns to society, immediate or in the conceivable future, it would have no reason to be funded on an equal footing.

[astroturfwar]

Dr. von Dassow highlights a crucial element to the debate that is often overlooked [even here on YouTube, it seems]: the gap between what is advertised and what is delivered in liberal arts education. However you value its relevance [I should say "their"--let's be honest: we're talking about a whole swath of programs], a huge number of students enroll in LA departments.

[Dizlexus]

Those who believe that the humanities should be limited are themselves limited. geodesicks' use of the word "bitch" reveals HIS depth as well the quality of his education, and character. From what disciplines did ideas like personal freedom and democracy come? Tell me Mr. geodesicks!

[Trace0Andrew]

I agree with Dr. von Dassow. In my opinion universities should really consider what their name stands for, universitas magistrorum et scholarium meaning a corporation of scholars and students, it is a perversion of the system to eliminate any classes or departments for the sake of a coach's or administration's paycheck. It is one thing to boost your sports to increase the income of your university. It is another to eliminate academia for their sake.

[geodesicks]

I think budget cuts in the arts and humanities reflects our progress as a species in much the same way as the budget cuts and often occasional shutdown of departments of theology in academia over the course of millenia. At one time, theology was the mainstay of academia. And it was the humanities for another period. We're coming to end of this period now. No doubt there will still remain departments of the humanities, just with very limited funding, perhaps as luxury education for the wealthy.

[wbg31245]

@geodesicks

Yeah, like those who go to Harvard, Carleton, and Macalester. By the way the average debt load at Carleton and Mac is LESS than that for graduates at the U of M. So people of ordinary means - who are SMART - can get a luxury education...

[geodesicks]

@wbg31245 : I agree. That's what I would've said given comment space. A tight budget will ensure that two types of people will go for these disciplines -- a) Very bright ones who know exactly what they're doing and why. They will earn their scholarships. b) The privately wealthy.

I would say the same about theology departments. Science departments, on the other hand, need to be exponentially expanded like the biochemistry dept she mentioned. And sports too because it feeds into the economy.

[geodesicks]

@OswaldvonWolkenstein : Those other things are learned by people in the course of any interesting career. They cannot and more importantly, should not, be learned in a classroom -- I've seen it generate more self-righteous indignation among ill-informed arts students than I'd care for. The only real source of knowledge, both of the world and ourselves, is by a thorough application of the Scientific Method.

[geodesicks]

@OswaldvonWolkenstein : Where did you pull that out from, that the scientific method itself was a product of the humanities? I suppose a complete lack of evidence never stopped a PhD in the humanities. Study in the sciences, like physics, is far more than just utilitarian -- it is a discipline of thought that is hard if not impossible to find in any field of the humanities, and one that is much required.

[lblanken]

@OswaldvonWolkenstein science is not training. Working as a scientist is important as well, making discoveries, etc. That said, I want scientists to have a good humanist background. Otherwise, they disregard the lives they are affecting.

[vfd999abc]

@geodesicks that's right the f#cking morons in B-school, half the "social siences" and the dentists, etc represent the very epitome of progress and reason. go count some beans, loser.

[neverquestionyoda]

@geodesicks I doubt you would feel that the process was so progressive if it were your field being downsized. In my opinion, it's more that academia has become a capitalist enterprise over the course of the last century. Science is more lucrative in terms of undergrad tuition, so it gets more support. That doesn't inherently make it more worthwhile.

[geodesicks]

@neverquestionyoda : I've already mentioned before that it would not be a progressive move to downsize my field, i.e. physics. A nation's continued ability to innovate depends on it. Not to mention the analytic ability, discipline of thought and appreciation for our place in the universe it brings to a population.

[neverquestionyoda]

@geodesicks These things are all true. Yet a Humanities degree also has the potential to increase analytic ability, discipline of thought & appreciation for our place in the universe. As for innovation, I feel obliged to point out the field of physics is itself an offshoot from Greek philosophers working in the tradition of Humanities. The result was the betterment of humankind. Perhaps instead of tearing each other down, our respective fields should work together with that goal in mind.

[sadunlap]

@ all with a utilitarian approach to education.

We lack specialists in Middle East languages and cultures. The U.S. military has thrown out gay intelligence personnel who are fluent in Arabic. The whole approach of the society and government toward education is narrow-minded and short-sighted. It's impossible to tell what information one will need. And the insights of a college education come from new ways of thinking not just information learned. BTW, Prof. Dassow is in the Near East dept

[geodesicks]

@sadunlap : That is a failure of the military, not the education system. Yes, it is impossible to know what information one will need, but its worth making educated guesses. Are we going to need a knowledge of theodicy or the broader field of theology anytime soon? No. Works of fiction from classical Greek antiquity? No. Physics. Probably yes. We have to make these decisions because we cannot fund everything and not everything is equally worth knowing.

[viscountoolongtweed]

@geodesicks

The arts have to be anthropocentric, it's the only culture we've had exposure to! And I think you've failed to understand the point about the relevance of the arts to modern day culture. Where would modern drama be without Greek tragedy? What would America be like today if it had not constructed such a classical image for itself in the beginning? If we remove an understanding of the past from our discourse we fail to understand why our culture has evolved to the place it has.

[geodesicks]

@viscountoolongtweed : "The arts have to be anthropocentric, it's the only culture we've had exposure to!" Correct, that is what I meant. Yes, I've clearly failed to understand the relevance of the arts in the modern and emerging culture. Modern drama would be somewhere else. Japanese manga is doing quite well without Greek tragedy, thank you. America would be somewhere else. We don't NEED to circle-jerk over our past in academic institutions, fun or comforting for some as it may be.

[jimbobzer0]

I'm very surprised at the sudden emergence of a science vs. arts debate. Surely her point is that if budgets are as tight as they are alleged then there are much better places to make savings than in teaching programmes, regardless of the subject. If all one looks at is the potential monetary gain from education, then the only courses left would be developing pharmaceuticals. Departments squabbling among themselves for an ever decreasing budget, will result in everyone losing out in the end.

[geodesicks]

@jimbobzer0 : How about teaching theology then with elaborate courses on theodicy, comparable in funding to physics departments? Look, it is clear that scholarship in the arts and humanities are becoming as obsolete as the romantic scholarship of theology. That is progress. And it should be reflected in academia as our species goes forward in our understanding of the universe and our relationship to it.

[jimbobzer0]

@geodesicks If it was educationally sound, then fine. If everyone doing a physics degree became a physicist you'd have more of a point, but they don't. Many people don't want to study science. Quality of education received by students must be the prime concern of a University, rather than budget concerns imposed by a bloated bureaucratic system that caused them in the first place. Departments need to stand as one to defend teaching quality or they will be systematically squeezed one by one.

[geodesicks]

@jimbobzer0 : I think training in the sciences, especially physics, should be a basic requirement up to undergraduate. On top of and after which one should be free to pursue whatever takes her fancy. I don't see any arguments she's making that couldn't be made by a theology department, or any department that cons kids into studying ancient Greek fairy-tales as an excuse for educational "excellence". I think academia in the arts and humanities is mostly a self-perpetuating scam.

[geodesicks]

@jimbobzer0 : Remember the Sokal hoax? Arts departments are infested with students and professors, looking to validate their circle-jerk, a.k.a intellectual "excellence", with techno-babble. It goes all the way to their peer-reviewed journal literature. A lot of scientists, especially physicists for some reason, Steven Weinberg, Alan Sokal, Minsky etc are standing up to this. Perhaps because the difference between genuine intellectual accomplishment and useless knowledge is clear to some of us.

[geodesicks]

Also, my comments supporting budget slashes in the arts and humanities departments in favor of science and technical departments has much to do with where I see the US economy *now* in relation to other economies. Especially the rise of politically totalitarian regimes like China that already have a larger say in geopolitics than they should. This is not the time to ruminate on antiquated classics, this is the time to innovate. China isn't messing around either, they know where the money is.

[ixat00]

@geodesicks And you don't think that the Chinese study their own "antiquated classics" alongside math and physics? I must tell you that they are extremely literate people. Even the supposed soulless party functionary Jiang Zemin wrote and published poetry. The way to improve American education isn't to turn out more narrow specialists at the expense of well-rounded individuals with a wide eruditions. It is often the latter who have the breadth and range to come up with interesting ideas.

[geodesicks]

@ixat00 : I didn't say that the Chinese don't study their own antiquity. I'm saying our relative mutual lack of knowledge of each other's antiquity does not hinder our exchange of ideas in the modern world. They have almost certainly lost relevance in the world today insofar as the modern vocabulary of ideas and concepts.

[geodesicks]

@ixat00 : And who says science education produces "narrow specialists"? Contemporary science education is one of the most perspective broadening experiences in terms of our understanding of the universe and our place in it. If anything, the arts promote an anthropocentric view of the world. Its relevance has been superseded by science in all its forms, from neuroscience to astrophysics, and this has to be reflected in the budgets of our academic systems.

[ixat00]

@geodesicks I'm not talking about our place in the universe as much as our place in society. I doubt very much a PhD makes one into a more aware or active citizen - I'm no philistine, but the image of the "out-of-touch academic" definitely has some truth to it. In any case, my point was merely that we shouldn't go too far in retooling the higher education system into a series of trade schools.

[wubbadubdub]

take that bruininks!

[pabaker55]

I realize now that the geo di sick s posts were most probably written by our premier cultural satirist Stephen Colbert. nicely done, sir.

[geodesicks]

@pabaker55 : And I think your username is hilarious. So +1 for that. :)

[pabaker55]

geodesicks is apparently a non de plume for a passionate supporter of the liberal arts (a discipline that taught him/her to argue convincingly) who raises such obviously biased and limited points as to embarrass any thinking advocate of technical fields of education. well done, geo di sick s .

[geodesicks]

@pabaker55 : Hahaha! Alright, you did make me laugh. +1 from me. Oh, please don't compare me to Colbert, I'm but a humble admirer of his most excellent art.

[viscountoolongtweed]

@geodesicks

Christ on a bike, the misconceptions! And the idea that we can still appreciate our shared culture to the same level as we do today if we underfund the humanities (and particularly the Classics) into extinction is ludicrous. The arts do need to be "taught" because they are just as Byzantine and indecipherable to the lone student as the sciences, and deserve funding because there are valuable, though not necessarily lucrative discoveries to be made about why we live the way we do.

[geodesicks]

@viscountoolongtweed : We are *making* our own culture, as we speak. YouTube, Facebook, heck, even the humble telegraph changed the paradigm of culture way beyond the relevance of the classics. The classics of western culture are not the classics of, say, the Indian culture -- not even remotely, they espouse vastly different values. And yet we are able to communicate over scientific matters, as well as political, with a common vocabulary that wouldn't lose much if the Ramayana were forgotten.

[fromthescriptorum]

@geodesicks

And, are you confusing classics with the field of Classics? Or are your sweeping generalizations supposed to cover everything under the umbrella of the college of arts and letters?

[DornierPfeil]

@fromthescriptorum geodesicks is one of those randroid libertarians who thinks that the only way to measure the worth of something is with dollar bills and the only endeavors that humanity should engage in are for-profit ones. What he is not telling you is that his biggest experiment in history is supported by European socialism and will never turn a single dollar's profit.

[geodesicks]

@DornierPfeil: You got it backwards. No, I do not think the measure of worth of something is in dollar bills. Dollar bills represent how much worth we attribute to what we consider wealth in society. Not all knowledge is worthless. Particle physics helps us understand the the fundamental structure of matter, energy, space and time. As spin offs, the technologies we develop end up as the world wide web, the PET scanner, missile defense, etc, etc.

[geodesicks]

@DornierPfeil : And btw, not that I'm making a case for profit right here, but if you think there's no profit to be reaped, you need to speak to DARPA, Swiss and other military organizations, and governments that are pouring their money into this. The worldly returns of particle physics and the limits to which it pushes technologies and drives innovation are all too familiar with them. We already have a successor to the internet for transmitting petabytes across continents, for example.

[geodesicks]

@DornierPfeil : When is the last time the department of arts and humanities came up with a paradigm shifting contribution to humanity? I can't think of one after the Gutenberg press. Look, its a fucking scam meant to fool kids into thinking they're gaining some worthy knowledge by studying antiquated fairy-tales and commentaries thereof, while paying the professors' bills and keeping academia in those depts churning, and the kids don't know what hit them till they're 25 and without a job.

[apotheosis00]

As a science major I'm confused that other "alleged" scientists and researchers would so quickly decry the importance of the arts. In a superficial sense, we see art and creativity as an emergent phenomenon of our biology. It is through our works we see the qualitative experience of life. It provides character to our observations and allows us to draw inferences from our data.

[geodesicks]

@apotheosis00 : Yes, art is an emergent feature of memetic length and time scales. It may indeed be absolutely central to being human, as evidenced from cave paintings in Spain or the birdsong-like precursors to human language still preserved in Kerala. They can and should be *empirically* studied for insights into what we are. But the practice of art itself need not be taught. Nothing is to be gained from commentary on the "classics". Let the market drive art and its appreciation, NOT academia.

[fromthescriptorum]

@geodesicks

What exactly IS the state of commentary within Classics now? What types of research within the field do you disapprove of, and why? And in what sort of "empirical" study are you suggesting? how does such a study differ from the discipline now?

[geodesicks]

@fromthescriptorum : Store the classics and historical records of classical antiquity on a digital format to be pondered on by citizens with wealth to match their curiosity, and perhaps a percent of academic funding proportional to the taxpayers' explicit interest in the matter. The emerging global culture, it seems to me, doesn't give a rat's ass about them, and therefore we should assign a rat's ass of our money to funding research into them. There are FAR more interesting questions to ponder.

[fromthescriptorum]

@geodesicks

There is actually a program in the field to attempt to digitize texts as we speak. i don't mean to be rude, and certainly not as rude as you are, but you have no idea what the field of Classics researches or provides. Further, you are confusing the idea of tech schools with universities, and you are missing the point of universities all together. Your arguments are rather insipid. Are you playing? Surely your intellectual indifference is just a posture?

[geodesicks]

@fromthescriptorum : I am aware of programs for digitizing classical manuscripts. I think that is roughly where things should end, with a limited budget (as compared to the sciences) for their analysis unless something truly extraordinary is found. I do appreciate archaeology, some elements of philology etc that goes into reconstructing our historical record. But I do not think they can offer fundamental insights into the nature of the universe or our place in it. Peripheral ones, sure.

[fromthescriptorum]

@geodesicks

Classics cannot offer the same, or even equal, insights into the nature of the universe, but they can offer insights into humanity, our history, our use of language, philosophy, the history of science, religion and religious oppression, the nature of military conflict and strategy, and, unfortunately, insights into the depths of our cruelty. Now, sitting in a class and naval-gazing over Proust is fairly worthless. But that happens very little in a modern university

[geodesicks]

@fromthescriptorum : I think we're on the same page. That is why I said -- a limited budget. It is important to know these things, and fascinating, and it provides a bigger perspective/narrative on our cultural evolution. Charting the development of human language while following the m-RNA trail is awesome. The naval-gazing, which I've seen all too many arts majors do and feign some profound knowledge is what is to be avoided. And severely limiting the budget, by design, should help that.

[geodesicks]

@fromthescriptorum : My indifference is not a posture. It has been expressed succinctly by Marvin Minsky. I am not asking for the complete annihilation of the arts and humanities, just a very limited budget which it should be allowed. That way, a) it draws only the very best into the field, b) it doesn't con youngsters into getting useless degrees that have little relevance outside academia, c) reserves most of the funds for the sciences that spur innovation for a robust economy, especially now.

[fromthescriptorum]

@geodesicks

To a limited extent i agree, but I highly disagree with the current fiscal management at the university level, which is Eva's primary complaint. Science should come first, but football should come last.

[geodesicks]

@fromthescriptorum : But football drives the economy more than academics in the classics do. Hence, given the times we are in, football coaches should be placed above faculties in the classics.

[geodesicks]

Would our exchange of ideas of scientific or political import change significantly if all knowledge of the western classics were suddenly erased from our minds? I submit "no" because our lack of knowledge of Chinese classics doesn't hinder much our communication with Chinese people. The modern vocab of ideas has homogenized enough to permit high fidelity transfer across cultures, thanks to the universality and dominance of science. The arts providing "context" is bullshit parading as profundity.

[Krocotto]

@geodesicks You demonstrate a very limited mind.

The kind of mind that thinks the only reason to do *anything* is for money, period.

Since that is the case, I challenge you to look up the research that finds that those students with engineering degrees with strong LA backgrounds do better *farther* up the career ladder, while those with weak LA backgrounds stay low on the ladder as basic techs.

That should be enough for a simple, profit-only motivated mind.

[geodesicks]

@Krocotto : Not really, my own research in particle physics is not driven by immediate profit but by human curiosity. However, I do not think all forms of curiosity are equivalent and worth pursuing. I do not think questions regarding the supersymmetric nature of the universe, extra dimensions or electroweak symmetry breaking are on the same footing as those on pieces of fiction written during classical antiquity or investigations into Klingon culture.

[Krocotto]

1:

@geodesicks You have proven my point far more eloquently than I ever could have.

To equate say, the Iliad with the trash of TV-generated popular sci-fi is to reveal a stunted mind.

As a teacher of physics I am saddened by the limits of your view. I speak not of embracing the idiocy of the moronic 'The Tau of Physics' type of garbage polluting the universe of ideas but of the beauty of Ovid's 'Metamorphosis.'

[geodesicks]

@Krocotto : Then I must have missed your point. Manga is not sci-fi. I have read Homer's Odyssey, though not the original Iliad, and *that* would be closer to sci-fi than most forms of manga. Clearly your understanding of manga is based on Americanized animated versions and you're missing an entire memetic ecosystem and the insights into our psyche it can bring. Cultural ecosystems of equal depth can be found in the Mahabharata. Its the "Tao", btw, a tau is a lepton, "tao" is from the I-Ching.

[Krocotto]

2:

@geodesicks: While I delight in the fields of physics and the great wonders therein, I count my live worth living for the chance to read the stunningly beautiful culture bridge that 'The Metamorphosis' was.

Life is not the lab, nor is it in the computer, it is the breath in your breast. Should you be lucky enough to live as long as I, you may come to understand that.

I pity you should you not, for otherwise your life, as your mind, would be too shallow.

[geodesicks]

@Krocotto : It is not as if I haven't read classic works. My only problem is that I have read them of multiple cultures, since I was a kid. I have read the Mahabharata, the Gita, parts of the Upanishads, a few works of Shakespeare, the I-Ching, the Quran, the works of Jalalludin Rumi, bits of Homer, etc. My personal library, which I keep open for kids, is filled with such literature. The point is to not get stuck on them, but to transcend them. Scientific knowledge does that brutally well.

[Krocotto]

@geodesicks Honesty at last. You have indeed "missed" my point.

Your shallow and limited views betray your ability to ever "get the point" and so you have missed this woman's point entirely.

The butchering of the American Education System, from grade through graduate levels, in the name of 'utility and profit' continues unabated, generating limited minds like yours.

America shall be left behind because of this butchering and the shallow folk like you won't even be able to wonder why.

[geodesicks]

@Krocotto: I am not sure where you saw dishonesty in my comments. I have been very clear that I do not understand the relevance of the arts and humanities. I think the graduate levels of education in the sciences are excellent. It doesn't generate limited minds, but rather very broad ones with a certain objectivity, dispassion and discipline in thought that I think you misunderstand as narrow or uncultured. America will be left behind because of poor science education at the high-school level.

[Krocotto]

@geodesicks Your ignorance of the value of classical knowledge is typical of the type of mind that cannot grasp the knowledge in the first place.

Even tyrants study history and the classics in order to understand the human condition itself as well as the human mind.

But that's okay for you. We need people who can only do simple tasks that the more educated people define for them.

You will never earn as much money as your better educated bosses.

But that's just bullshit, right?

[maddogdelta]

That is awesome...

I saw the same kind of crap happen to a local school in the 80's and 90's. There were several programs that were considered some of the best in the East, that were just whittled away due to cost cutting and revenue generation. It turned from a respected liberal arts university into a glorified Bryant and Stratton. But hey! The basketball team got into the NCAA Tournament!

[geodesicks]

“With all the money that we are throwing away on humanities and art - give me that money and I will build you a better student." - Marvin Minsky (a father of modern AI)

[maddogdelta]

@geodesicks I'm sure glad that Marvin knew how to write that...or did he say that and someone else wrote it down for him?

[SingingRaven]

Ugh, these comments are depressing. It's true that academic departments are losing a ridiculous amount of cash to administrators that wield too much power, and that the wholesale closure of departments is surely never a good thing. What's so wrong with knowledge for knowledge's sake?

[geodesicks]

Naah, funding to the arts should be limited in comparison to the sciences and technological fields. Those are the money makers of an economy and the sources of real knowledge and enlightenment in the world. In my experience, liberal arts graduates are indisciplined and fuzzy thinkers who do more harm than good. For example, I see more such people sympathetic to the movement of Islam in the world, as if it were a morally equivalent culture. More scientists and brutally analytical minds are needed

[darkmiles22]

@geodesicks I agree the world should look far less favorably on the veneration of pedophiles and that an appreciation and understanding of math and science ought to be more widespread, I'd think the best way to achieve such would be to promote a more diverse curriculum in college rather than a shift away from arts and humanities.

[geodesicks]

@darkmiles22 : How does a diverse curriculum help, exactly? The arts and humanities in the US churn out leftist pseudo-intellectual morons in their undergraduate programs, often funded by Saudi interests, like in Harvard. You cannot teach ideology in physics, chemistry, biology, mathematics, computer science etc, but you CAN in political "science", international relations and other such vacuous crap. So, we should stick to studying *nature* in our universities. Liberal arts are academic scams.

[Cheshie]

Shove it up their asses, Eva!

[PhlegmMaster]

Brilliant speech, both in content and delivery.

[CodeSculptor]

She rules!

[hmichaelpower]

This sharp thinking ought to go viral and be experienced by everyone.

[fibrillatorD]

bitch haz a fuzzy think?

[wbg31245]

@fibrillatorD

bitch? YOU have a fuzzy think!

[geodesicks]

@fibrillatorD : Bitch DOES have fuzzy think. More science. Less arts. We don't NEED pseudo-intellectual arts and humanities graduates. We need scientists who can tell us how the world works and our place in it to the best of our current knowledge. We need engineers and technicians to make use of that knowledge to make the world a better place for us. Arts and humanities graduates, in my experience, are best employed at flipping burgers. Very little return for society, hence the high tuition.

[vysehrad]

@geodesicks I'm sorry that you could not afford the tuition and are reduced to flipping burgers, hence your poor understanding of what the arts and humanities are, but your concern about the world being a better place is inexplicable in light of your stressing the need to eliminate anything in it to enjoy (the arts) or the social *sciences* which enable us to understand how humans interact (psychology, sociology, anthropology - humanities). Get a student loan, you can still do it, too.

[geodesicks]

@vysehrad : I'm not interested in defending ad hominems much, but I am a practicing particle physicist and work on the biggest experiment of our species. I do not seek to eliminate the enjoyment of the arts, I simply don't think it needs to be *taught* and that trying to do so is counter-productive, impractical and dangerous. I have friends and family who've wasted time and money chasing romantic dreams in those departments, ending up with barely any analytical skills or job prospects.

[vysehrad]

@geodesicks "I simply don't think it needs to be taught" Let me be glad to inform you that you mistaken.

[vysehrad]

@geodesicks "I have friends and family who... [ended] up with barely any analytical skills or job prospects."

And I have encountered a youtube commenter with apparently excellent training in the sciences whose analytical skills also suffer greatly when it comes to certain topics outside of his area of expertise. I do not, however, condemn the teaching of physics on that basis.

[geodesicks]

@vysehrad : And how would that comment reflect a dearth of analytical prowess? That is what I've seen happen, and I have had to support one of them for a while who happens to be my sibling. And I know plenty of people with degrees in the humanities who are close to me, working jobs entirely unrelated to their degree and below the break even point of the cost of their education. So I am speaking from experience, empirical data, anecdotal as it may be for now.

[vysehrad]

@geodesicks Also, if you want to analyze the analogy rigorously, you could see that I was not saying that physics makes you poor at analysis. I was saying, again, that I do not therefore jump to the faulty conclusion that my judgment of your analytical skills leads me to conclude that funding for the sciences should be slashed,

[vysehrad]

@geodesicks You shifted the goalposts, as earlier you said that the arts did not need to be taught.

You acknowledge, I am sure, that one of the fundamentals of education is teaching those analytical skills we speak of - critical thinking. If you gain that, then you have been well-served, whether you end up in the same field you studied or not.

[vysehrad]

@geodesicks I do acknowledge that a science degree leaves one more likely to land a stable job than an arts degree. This is one of the hazards of our society with freedom to choose one's path: the goals people pursue as a population do not necessarily match up precisely with the job market.

I am in the arts and I also acknowledge that you are more likely to find poor analytical skills in the music field than in geology. But I think arts education just needs to be reformed, not shrunk.

[geodesicks]

@vysehrad : I do think people get conned into pursuing an arts degree on the assumption that it would be equally useful in securing a job, or that the knowledge accrued in the course of their education would be deemed useful, at large, outside the circle jerk of academia that is invested in luring in impressionable minds. Limiting the budget makes it clear that it is only for those who know what they're doing or have private wealth to back them up, given no direct feedback into the economy.

[fromthescriptorum]

@geodesicks

That "bitch" is a person I know, so try having a little respect. Cowards and insignificant keyboard warriors resort to such crass vulgarity. Now, I know you are, as you claim, working on the greatest project in physics for humanity ,and you are not really just a petroleum transfer engineer at some Chevron with a slight case of angst, but do you find it strange that hordes of top scientists come to the defense, often strongly, of the arts and humanities? Learn from your betters.